Settlers, Not Immigrants
POETRY FORMAT, 5 Jul 2021
Haunani-Kay Trask – TRANSCEND Media Service
Settlers, not immigrants,
from America, from Asia.
Come to settle, to take.
To take from the Native
that which is Native:
Land, water, women,
sovereignty.
Settlers, not immigrants,
bringing syphilis and leprosy,
Jehovah and democracy.
Settlers, settling
our Native Hawai‘i,
inscribing their
lies of discovery,
of penury, of victory.
Settlers, not immigrants.
Killing us off
disease by disease, lie by lie,
one by one.
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Haunani-Kay Trask (3 Oct 1949 – 3 Jul 2021) was a Hawaiian nationalist poet, educator, political scientist, author, and professor emeritus at the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa. Trask co-wrote and co-produced the award-winning documentary Act of War: The Overthrow of the Hawaiian Nation, winning nine different awards in three different countries.
Tags: Anglo America, Asia and the Pacific, Haunani-Kay Trask, Hawaii, Hawaiian Culture, Hawaiian Sovereignty, History, Indigenous Rights, Poetry
This article originally appeared on Transcend Media Service (TMS) on 5 Jul 2021.
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